Friday, September 23, 2016

J Street's Wrong Turn

While the US has consistently opposed illegal settlement expansion, it has allowed Americans to make tax-deductible contributions to groups actively engaged in dispossessing Palestinians of their land and aiding the spread of settlements. Today, we're calling on the Treasury Department to review whether tax-deductible treatment for donations to such groups meet the relevant requirements -- and, if not, to cut off the flow of tax-deductible US dollars...To: Treasury Secretary Jack Lew - Internal Revenue Service (IRS) requirements are clear about the criteria organizations must meet to benefit from tax-deductible, charitable donations: Their activities must not be “illegal [or] contrary to a clearly defined and established public policy.”

Support for settlements...contradicts the clearly established, bipartisan US policy of opposition to settlement expansion. Why should US taxpayers subsidize activities expressly designed to oppose and undermine decades of consistent US policy, which are illegal under international conventions signed and ratified by the United States? This is a question we’re asking of the Treasury in an action we launched last week.

As a Member of Knesset, my job is to speak out on behalf of the best interests of my fellow citizens and my country...the settler movement and its powerful allies in the Netanyahu government have been quietly laying the groundwork for annexation in the West Bank’s Area C...This process is led in part by influential right-wing NGOs (like the group Regavim),...Incredibly, Regavim and their fellow settler groups often benefit from tax-free contributions coming from the USA -- even while they actively oppose the two-state solution, undermining key US and Israeli interests.That’s why J Street has called on the US Treasury Department to review whether the activities of Regavim should make them ineligible to receive tax-free contributions...I’m so grateful to J Street supporters like you, and to all those Jews around the world who love Israel and know that supporting Israelis means standing up for diplomacy and peace -- and speaking out when our government’s policies put our values and security at risk.Thank you for all that you do,MK Michal Rozin

But it's based on a lie.First of all, that "public policy" claim is wrong. it's an administration policy, not public.Whereas way back in 1978, a legal opinion was expressed by the State Department's legal advisor that activity related to the promoting and facilitating of Jewish civilian residency in the disputed areas of the former Palestine Mandate territories not currently under Israel sovereignty (and let's not forget that all of Jerusalem is still considered as I write by the State Department not to be Israel territory) is

inconsistent with international law.

the arguments are weak and misrepresent international law. Even a Peace Now resource reveals, as does this one, that most of the US Presidents' words they use avoid the legal aspect as has President Obama as he refers to the communities as "illegitimate'. Then Secretary of State Madeleine Albright actually admitted the Jewish communities across the Green Line are legal as have many other American political figures and scholars.

“I do not think racial [discrimination] in America, with our own unique history, is the same as the unique situation of Israel and the Palestinians,” Ellen Aprill, a professor at Loyola Law School

Indeed, as my second point, the challenge to a presumed tax-exemption status must prove a negation of or actions of that organization is does it go againts "fundamental public policy" and "well-defined standards of public policy" as stated clearly here. It must be shown to be "contrary to well-established and clearly defined public policy."

As further clarified in IV Scott on Trusts Section 377 (3d ed. 1967):

"A trust cannot be created for a purpose which is illegal. The purpose is illegal ... if the trust tends to induce the commission of crime or if the accomplishment of the purpose is otherwise against public policy.... Where a policy is articulated in a statute making certain conduct a criminal offense, then ..., a trust is illegal if its performance involves such criminal conduct, or if it tends to encourage such conduct." . ....In determining whether activities of this type are consistent with IRC 501(c)(3), the Service relies on a three-part test. Rev. Rul. 80-278. Such activities will be considered permissible under IRC 501(c)(3) if: (1) The purpose of the organization is charitable; (2) the activities are not illegal, contrary to a clearly defined and established public policy, or in conflict with express statutory restrictions;

The Treasury Department is empowered to enforce "established public policy" with respect to tax-exempt charities.' Under this public policy power, the Treasury has revoked the tax-exempt charitable status of organizations that discriminated against blacks, organizations whose members engaged in civil disobedience against war, and organizations involved in illegal activity. The Treasury interprets its public policy power as applying to any activity that violates clear public policy...The point at which a public policy is sufficiently established for purposes of applying the Treasury's public policy power is unclear...Presently, neither Congress or the United States Supreme Court has decided conclusively whether race-based affirmative action violates public policy.

Besides the obvious, that Jewish resettlement activity in Judea and Samaria is not to be compared to the rest of the examples - which are mainly race-oriented or proven criminal activity but also internal American issues and to extend the IRS power to actions of non-Americans, even if supported by American citizens - it is clear that no illegality is involved.

But more important, American public policy was quite the opposite. It supported Jewish resettlement activity through the Anglo-American Convention of 1924 when the territory defined as the Jewish national and historic homeland was all the region between the sea and the river. If it was legal then, it's legal now and as there is no equal sovereign power to Israel who can prove claims to that territory, all this legalese fumfitting (to mutter, splutter and stutter in Yiddish) is just pro-Palestine propaganda (PPP).

1 comment:

How much regulatory power does Washington exercise over the economic autonomy of the States. The buying and selling of Slaves as property across inter state lines served as the animus which divided how States within the Union interpreted the Commerce Clause of the Constitution. Does Washington have the power to establish "establishment" monopolies? Andrew Jackson in 1825, a Jeffersonian, definitely ruled NOT. All post Civil War governments have embraced Hamiltons idea of the role of the Central Government vs. the States. In 1913 the Wilson Administration established the 3rd National Bank called the Federal Reserve; this reversal of Andrew Jacksons' free banking policy caused America to duplicate the economic policies of Europe; Washington now became the king maker of Corporate monopolies.

Teddy Roosevelt's anti trust laws equally applied in the inverse! Washington not only had the power to break up monopolies but it had the power to establish monopolies. This crucial peace of the Pax American empire permitted the Wilson government to impose a Central Bank and completely uproot free banking established by the Jackson Administration in 1825.

The direction of democracy as opposed to Republic post Civil War Washington clearly intended. The Supreme Court ruled in the 1880s that Corporations existed as People. The Wilson government in 1912 and 1913 passed the 17th Amendment which supersedes Article I, §3, Clauses 1 and 2 of the Constitution. State Legislatures lost the power to appoint US Senators to Washington; a key provision of States Rights the post Civil War Yankee government of empire had negated. The US Constitution nor the Declaration of Independence ever once refer to the American Republic as a democracy. The Framers of the Constitution limited the voting franchise strictly to land owning white males. The expansion of the voting franchise defines the democratic sufferage movements of the Wilson era and Martin Luther King.

Post Civil War America the democracy as opposed to pre Civil War America the Republic transformed politics in Washington by silently establishing the illegal 4th Branch of the Federal Government - the lobbies. The lobbies serve the interests of the establishment Federally created Corporate monopolies. Recall that a democracy elected the Fascist Nazis into power! Post Civil War Washington politics jabbered about cleaning up Washington. But this political rhetoric hid the corrosive corruption which defines the Patronage Lobby system of the American democracy. Corporations buy and sell politicians judges and police in the American democracy. The post Civil War Yankee government have slipped down the icy path of exchanging a democracy for a Republic and Socialist Fascism for freedom.﻿

About Me

American born, my wife and I moved to Israel in 1970. We have lived at Shiloh together with our family since 1981. I was in the Betar youth movement in the US and UK. I have worked as a political aide to Members of Knesset and a Minister during 1981-1994, lectured at the Academy for National Studies 1977-1994, was director of Israel's Media Watch 1995-2000 and currently, I work at the Menachem Begin Heritage Center in Jerusalem. I was a guest media columnist on media affairs for The Jerusalem Post, op-ed contributor to various journals and for six years had a weekly media show on Arutz 7 radio. I serve as an unofficial spokesperson for the Jewish Communities in Judea & Samaria.